LSU's win over Georgia topped the ratings for all conference championship games

CBS led all college football telecasts over the weekend with a 7.4 overnight for the LSU-Georgia SEC Championship on Saturday afternoon, up 17% from a 6.3 overnight for Auburn-South Carolina last year. That number, however, remains down from the record-setting 11.8 overnight for Alabama-Florida in ’09 and down from a 10.4 rating in ’08. The inaugural Big Ten Championship, which featured Wisconsin-Michigan State, earned a 4.3 overnight on Fox Saturday night. Milwaukee topped all markets for the game with a 28.3 local rating. On Friday night, Fox earned a 3.2 overnight for the inaugural Pac-12 Championship. Portland led markets with a 20.1 local rating for the game. ABC’s best college football number for the weekend was the Oklahoma-Oklahoma State game on Saturday night (3.7 overnight), which served as the de facto Big 12 title game. That rating was down 30% from last year’s Oklahoma-Nebraska Big 12 Championship. ESPN’s broadcast of the Clemson-Virginia Tech ACC Championship on Saturday night earned a 1.7 overnight, down 15% from a 2.0 rating for Virginia Tech-Florida State last year (Austin Karp, THE DAILY).

GAME

MATCHUP

DATE

NET

TIME (ET)

RAT.

SEC Championship

LSU-Georgia

12/3

CBS

4:00-8:15pm

7.4

Big Ten Championship

Wisconsin-Michigan State

12/3

Fox

8:15pm-12:00am

4.3

Pac-12 Championship

Oregon-UCLA

12/2

Fox

8:15-11:45pm

3.2

Conference USA
Championship

Southern Miss-Houston

12/3

ABC

12:00-4:00pm

3.1

ACC Championship

Clemson-Virginia Tech

12/3

ESPN

8:00-11:30pm

1.7

MAC Championship

Northern Illinois-Ohio

12/2

ESPN2

7:00-10:30pm

0.6

ENOUGH, GUS: In St. Petersburg, Tom Jones writes Fox' Gus Johnson, who called the Big Ten Championship game, once again "took a big event and made it about himself." He spent Saturday night, "as always, blasting out screams and grunts and groans." Jones: "Maybe his style is sincere, but I'm not so sure. It feels like schtick" (ST. PETERSBURG TIMES, 12/5). In N.Y., Phil Mushnick writes, "Based on the screaming throughout the Michigan State-Wisconsin Big Ten championship game on Saturday, someone kept sneaking in to stick Gus Johnson with a cattle prod" (N.Y. POST, 12/5). ESPN Radio 540 Milwaukee's Jason Wilde wrote on his Twitter feed, "I think this is a perfect game for Gus Johnson to be doing. I just wish he had saved all the yelling/theatrics for the many plays deserving." But the Miami Herald's Israel Guttierez wrote, "Seriously, Gus Johnson just needs to do every game in every sport. Every game would be AWESOME!!!" Meanwhile, GolfChannel.com's Jason Sobel wrote, "Gus Johnson could make a two-foot putt in a Wednesday pro-am sound like somebody just won the Masters."

IT KEEPS GOING, AND GOING, AND GOING...: In Salt Lake City, Scott Pierce writes during ESPN2's broadcast of the BYU-Hawaii game Saturday, announcers Carter Blackburn and Brock Huard mentioned "about 863 times" that Hawaii "had to win in order to go to a bowl." It was "impossible to keep track of how many times the subject came up because they talked about it over and over and over again." Pierce: "Blackburn's constant repetition of the same phrases ... was excessive and annoying. And the one thing you don't want your announcers to do is aggravate viewers" (SALT LAKE TRIBUNE, 12/5).